Thought I had a decent idea of what I was getting into but now it's become clear that I didn't!
Set up an empty 30 gallon five days ago, laid in eco-complete, added a handful of plants from petsmart (local fish stores are very limited in my neck of the woods) along with fertilizer tabs and filled up the tank. Low lighting (1 watt per gallon) and no CO2. The water was super cloudy and almost opalescent the next day so I've been waiting since then for it to clear which it finally is.
Stupidly forgot to grab a water testing kit when I was at the store before but finally got my hands on one today and tested the water; ammonia/nitrates/nitrites are good but the ph is ridiculously high.
I did accidentally stir up one of the fertilizer tabs when I had to shift a plant away from the filter - would that have caused the high ph? Or are the plants causing that?
No fish in the tank yet since I wasn't quite sure of when to add them, but does that mean I should have been adding some sort of supplements to the water in the meantime? And when typically is a good time to add fish?
Since the water has finally cleared up, I've noticed that it looks like there is some white fuzz growing around the root/rizome portion of the plants which seems ominous to me - is that a bad sign or reasonably normal? Been running around 8 hours of light a day since I thought that with the low lighting they might need a bit extra time, but is that too much?
Oh, and the plants in the tank are:
amazon sword
narrow leaf java fern
green crypt
anubias nana
Thank you in advance for any guidance you have to offer!
Set up an empty 30 gallon five days ago, laid in eco-complete, added a handful of plants from petsmart (local fish stores are very limited in my neck of the woods) along with fertilizer tabs and filled up the tank. Low lighting (1 watt per gallon) and no CO2. The water was super cloudy and almost opalescent the next day so I've been waiting since then for it to clear which it finally is.
Stupidly forgot to grab a water testing kit when I was at the store before but finally got my hands on one today and tested the water; ammonia/nitrates/nitrites are good but the ph is ridiculously high.
I did accidentally stir up one of the fertilizer tabs when I had to shift a plant away from the filter - would that have caused the high ph? Or are the plants causing that?
No fish in the tank yet since I wasn't quite sure of when to add them, but does that mean I should have been adding some sort of supplements to the water in the meantime? And when typically is a good time to add fish?
Since the water has finally cleared up, I've noticed that it looks like there is some white fuzz growing around the root/rizome portion of the plants which seems ominous to me - is that a bad sign or reasonably normal? Been running around 8 hours of light a day since I thought that with the low lighting they might need a bit extra time, but is that too much?
Oh, and the plants in the tank are:
amazon sword
narrow leaf java fern
green crypt
anubias nana
Thank you in advance for any guidance you have to offer!
